by Terence P. Jeffrey
Government employees in the United States topped 23 million for the first time in December, according to the employment numbers released today by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
In November, according to BLS, there were 22,951,000 people employed by the local, state and federal governments in the United States. In December, there were 23,003,000.
“Government employment increased by 52,000 in December,” said the BLS in its statement on the jobs numbers. “Employment continued to trend up in local government (+37,000) and federal government (+7,000).
“Government added an average of 56,000 jobs per month in 2023, more than double the average monthly gain of 23,000 in 2022,” said BLS.
Prior to this December, the largest number of people ever employed by government in the United States was 22,996,000 in May 2010, which was a year when the federal government was conducting a Census and federal employment ordinarily spikes. In December 2009, for example, federal employment was 2,831,000, according to BLS. It jumped to 3,416,000 in May 2010, then dropped back to 2,866,000 by October of that year.
The 23,003,000 government employees in the United States in December equaled 14.6% of the total of 157,232,000 nonfarm employees in the country during the month.
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Terence P. Jeffrey is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation.
